87. Lyle Lovett, 'If I Had a Boat' (1988)

In the mid-Eighties Lyle Lovett emerged on the bookish, folkie fringe of a new traditionalism that reacted against the pop leaning of the Urban Cowboy era. Consisting of little more than guitars – a finger-picked acoustic and a welling slide – "If I Had a Boat" is nothing to ride a mechanical bull too. And the abstract lyrics, which imagined Roy Rogers as confirmed bachelor and Tonto losing patience with the Lone Ranger, demanded concentration. Absurdist and meditative as it is, "If I Had a Boat" arose from a true story. Lovett claims he once tried to ride a pony across a pond. He wished he'd had a boat. By Keith Harris